
GopyiightN?._ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




REV. SETH REED ; D. D. 



The Story of My Life 



SETH REED 

it 
Detroit Annual Conference of the 

Methodist Episcopal Church 

1914 




Cincinnati: JENNINGS AND GRAHAM 
New York: EATON AND MAINS 






Copyright, 1914, by 

Jennings and Graham- 



MAR 23 1914 



fa 

©CI.A371001 



Resolution Adopted by Detroit Annual Conference, 

1912. 

"We, the members of the Detroit Annual Conference, 
desire to congratulate our beloved brother and co-laborer, 
Dr. Seth Reed, on having entered his ninetieth year and his 
sixty-eighth year as a minister of our Lord Jesus Christ; 
and should his health warrant, we request him to prepare 
and preach at our next Annual Conference a sermon ap- 
propriate to the occasion. 

"FRANK S. ROWLAND: 9 



Resolution Touching Dr. Seth Reed's "Story of My Life' 9 
Adopted by Detroit Annual Conference, 1913. 

" Whereas, The Detroit Conference last year, by reso- 
lution, invited the Rev. Seth Reed, D. D., to preach or 
speak Q t this Conference session in memorial of his nine- 
tieth birthday; and 

" Whereas, Dr. Reed graciously responded in the recital 
of ' The Story of My Life,' addressing the Conference for 
nearly one hour and a half to the great delight and edifi- 
cation of a large audience ; therefore be it 

"Resolved, That this Conference express its apprecia- 
tion of his splendid effort and respectfully request Dr. 
Reed, if it shall be convenient for him, to commit this story 
to writing and publish the same in book form. 

"(Signed) GEORGE ELLIOTT, 
A. R. JOHNS, 
H. ADDIS LEESON, 
FRANK S. ROWLAND." 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Early Life, 7 

Conversion, 11 

Teaching School, 14 

My Schooling and Springville Academy, 18 

Teaching in Grand Rapids and Studying 

Law, 19 

My Last School and Change of Life- Work, 23 

First Conference and Circuit, •> - 29 

Michigan Conference in 1845, and Maple- 
ton Circuit, - - - - - - 36 

Marriage and Bennington Circuit, - 40 

Genesee, Mt. Clemens, and Pontiac, - 48 

Ypsilanti and Monroe, - 52 

Ann Arbor and Port Huron, - - - 56 

Woodward and Lafayette, 63 

Ypsilanti, Second Term, - - * - 70 

Providence Conference, ... 76 

Home Again in Detroit Conference, - 81 

Retired Relation, 87 



The Story of My Life 



Early Life. 

My parents were born in Southern Con- 
necticut and were from early New England 
ancestry; my father's ancestors coming to 
Providence in 1660, and my mother's to Bos- 
ton in 1630. Both families trace their records 
back to early English times, having owned es- 
tates in England prior to the coming of William 
the Conqueror in 1066. 

The first of my mother's ancestors in this 
country was William Buell. He was one of 
those religious enthusiasts known as Puritans, 
of whom Lord Russell wrote, "They were the 
most remarkable body of men the world has 
ever produced." The Buell family went with 
a company of Church people from Boston, cut- 
ting their way through the dense wilderness 
and settling at what was afterwards Norwich, 
and there establishing the first settlement made 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

by white men in Connecticut. Colony and 
Church were one at that time in New England, 
and the Church the important one, for the col- 
onists who settled this new country brought 
with them the Church organization; so these 
early families came with strong religious con- 
victions. 

Both families were represented in the co- 
lonial councils and with those who fought and 
bled and died to make the Nation free. Well 
do I remember, when a small boy, seeing on 
the platform at the annual training-day, some 
half dozen of the old Revolutionary soldiers 
with their canes and crutches, or in their wheel- 
chairs, and of hearing them talk over their 
war-experiences. 

When my parents were married "the star 
of empire" had just taken its western course; 
so they moved west into the town of Hart- 
wick, Otsego County, New York, where they 
bought a small farm covered by a thin soil, 
under which was hard-pan and over which 
were rocks and stones. 

Here were born five children, of which I 

8 , 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

was the youngest* My father died four 
months before my birth, and was buried on 
the banks of the Susquehanna. Among my ear- 
liest memories is that of seeing my mother weep 
while she thought of the departed one, and I 
would weep because she wept. In addition to 
her loneliness was her sorrow at learning that 
I had inherited the asthma from her, was born 
with the dreadful disease, and suffered with it 
in the worst form I ever knew for over twenty 
years. 

When I was about thirteen years old my 
mother sold her farm, and the family moved 
to Mansfield, Cattaraugus County, New York, 
then a wilderness country. Here my only 
brother, Horace, four years older than myself, 
began clearing away the immense forest trees 
to prepare the ground for raising the family 
supplies. Those were the days of absolute 
economy, if not of pinching want. We found 
that necessity had access to many a nature's 
larder which had been in waiting for those who 
would seek it. Our sugar was given us by the 

*My birth was on June 2, 1823. 

9 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

tall maples; our meats were furnished princi- 
pally from the woods. Occasionally a neigh- 
bor would kill a deer or a bear, and then pieces 
would be sent to the other neighbors, thus 
allowing those wild animals to assist in culti- 
vating neighborhood friendships. Not able 
myself to do much labor, I would often catch 
strings of speckled trout, with which the 
streams in those forests abounded, and thus 
started some young ideas of my own impor- 
tance in the family. On account of my ill- 
health I was able to attend the little country 
schools but a few days at a time, for the attacks 
of asthma were frequent, and each would hold 
me on the floor in a horizontal position, face 
downward, generally for one or two days and 
nights, when I would be about a week in re- 
covering. This disease made me slender and 
haggard; my chest was affected so that while 
in my teens I was bowed like "a tottering wall," 
and was familiarly called "Death on Stilts." 
When I began to recover from the asthma, 
which was not till after I was twenty years of 
age, I resolved, if possible, to recover the form 

10 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

of my chest and shoulders, which I did after 
years of persistent practice. 

Conversion. 

It was while our family lived in Mansfield 
that the greatest change of our lives occurred; 
that is, in the matter of religion. My mother 
had been a professed Universalist and had 
taught her children that belief. In my child- 
hood years I would hear her converse with her 
neighbors of the same belief, and generally 
their conversation would be loaded with criti- 
cisms upon Christians and the Church. Hav- 
ing heard so much of their objections to re- 
ligion and their arguments in favor of their 
belief, I became quite a young adept in their 
use, and I would pride myself on my ability to 
resist the approach of Christians who sought 
the salvation of my soul. But when I was six- 
teen years old, and my mother about fifty, there 
began a new chapter in our history. My oldest 
sister became a Christian, and the skepticism 
of her Universalist husband drove her to the 
study of the Bible doctrines of salvation. Her 

ii 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

life and arguments, attended by God's Spirit, 
caused a shaking of our mother's belief, and 
she was brought under deep conviction for sin, 
and finally came into the peace of God. We 
children saw a marked change in her even be- 
fore she spoke of it to us. I think the first 
expression she ever made of her new faith and 
joy she made .to me. One morning before I 
went out she came and sat by my side and said: 
"My dear boy, I have loved you intensely, have 
cared for your health and comfort to the best 
of my ability, but I have never been a true 
mother to you. I have never spoken to you 
about your soul, nor have I ever prayed with 
you as I should have done. I ask your for- 
giveness, and now I want to pray with you." 
Then she knelt by my side, and I still sat in 
my chair, for I had never heard praying in my 
home, and did not know how to act. But, O, 
how mother prayed ! She prayed for me ; she 
took hold of God, and God took hold of me. 
When she arose I walked out to the fields an 
unhappy youth. A spirit was on me that I 
was not acquainted with. I felt that mother 

12 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

was right and I was wrong. For many days 
I was wretched while the conviction grew upon 
me that I was a sinner and the faith that my 
mother had taught me was worthless. This 
conviction seemed to increase until one day, 
when I was working in a field alone, it seemed 
to me that I could not live, and I knew not 
what to do. I found a little hollow, and went 
down to the bottom of it and lay on the ground 
and prayed. It was the first time I had ever 
prayed. I did not know what to say and do 
not know what I said; but I know that I called 
for mercy, and I think my call was pretty loud. 
I do know that when I came up from that 
hollow everything around me seemed changed 
— everything. The change seemed beautiful, 
transcendently beautiful. I now know that the 
real change was within and was substantial, and 
the substance produced its shadow, the seem- 
ing beauty without. That was the beginning 
of life for me, and I would sooner lose any 
other part of life from my memory than lose 
that. O, how many times has my heart 
thanked God for the gift of my mother! And 

*3 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

haw I wish other mothers would let God speak 
through their lips to their children as mine did 
to me! During the day of my conversion I 
was supremely happy, and I often wondered 
how I could inform the neighbors, who were to 
have a prayer-meeting that afternoon, how I 
felt. But as I approached the schoolhouse, two 
or three brethren who were out talking said, 
as soon as they observed me, "Why, Seth, you 
have found the Lord, have n't you I" That 
broke the fetters; my soul was free, and we 
had a glorious time. 

Teaching School. 

At the age of sixteen, being anxious to do 
something towards my own support, I hired 
to a farmer to work for the summer, but after 
a trial of a few days I had to leave and go 
home sick and sad. "What shall I do for a 
living?" was the question in my mind by night 
and day. I finally thought I would prepare as 
best I could and try to teach school ; the work 
for preparation would have to be done by 
myself. So I gathered a few text-books such 

14 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

as were in use at that time — The Columbian 
Spelling Book, Murray's English Reader, 
Kirkam's Grammar, Daboll's Arithmetic — and 
began my work. I applied for the little sum- 
mer school in our own neighborhood, which 
was to begin in two weeks. The director said 
he would hire me, but could pay me only what 
they would pay a woman teacher — five dollars 
a month, and I board around. I accepted the 
terms and began teaching my first school 
June i, 1840, one day before I was seventeen 
years of age. I had not been told where to 
begin my boarding around; so at the close of 
school that day I walked a long way to the 
director's home. He being not in, I told his 
wife my errand, and she replied in prompt and 
definite language which I understood, "I have 
twelve boys of my own, and I will not have 
another in my house." I started for my 
mother's home, and I think it rained a few 
drops, though I saw no clouds in the sky. My 
mother cheered me, and I went through the 
summer school receiving my fifteen dollars for 
three months' teaching, and perhaps felt a 

15 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

little like a business man. I took my money 
and went to pay the merchant in Flushing who 
had trusted me for some clothes. He handed 
me back the money and said, "Take it and go 
to school." I shall never forget how that act 
surprised and encouraged me. 

The next winter I taught school in a dis- 
trict adjoining my first. Towards spring I was 
shocked to learn that several of my scholars 
were having the whooping-cough. My mother 
had been often warned by physicians that I 
must not be allowed to have that disease, as 
they were sure I could not live through it; 
hence I had been carefully kept from exposure. 
Some of my scholars had it very severely, one 
or two died, and my school was broken up. 
Of course, I and my family were excited, and 
our surprise at my remaining unaffected was 
greatly increased by learning, upon' investiga- 
tion, that I was the person who gave the dis- 
ease to the school: I had it, but so slightly 
that neither I nor any one else knew it at the 
time. The next winter, 1841, I taught in a 
district adjoining the one in which I taught the 

16 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

winter before. I found my employment very 
pleasant, especially as it afforded opportunities 
for learning, which I endeavored to improve. 
One day there called at my school an aged 
man, blind, poor, and homeless, but intelligent 
and religious. He would meet some of his ex- 
penses by selling some verses which he would 
compose and get printed. One verse I remem- 
ber he composed on Universalism, which was 
then more popular than it is to-day, as follows : 

" Mode by an ancient author given, 
A speedy way to get to heaven, 
In four short lines without a schism, 
Essence of Universalism — 

Judas of old, so brave and bold, 
When by his Master cursed, 
With his own cord outswung his Lord 
And got to heaven first." 

He composed the following unique acrostic, 
and said that as my name was so short and 
could not be spliced, he had been obliged to 
splice the article, so the right section of the 
acrostic is to be read first, then turn the book 
upside down and read the other section from 
bottom upwards : 

17 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

siq jo vpnoA 9ip SuissedinSublime in the thoughts of 

'puim his heart 

DUijojd 12 ipiM p^AVopuEach virtue as bright as the 

'q3e}s am morning, 

uo }de mou yz\p jsoui aqThe beauties of science and 

pmi| art 

-aq Suia^9j 9q oj sui99s 9His character ever adorning, 

'9AOqE 

sj9AVod 9ip Aq p9A(os9Replenished with wisdom to 

U9AIS 9q take 

jpqs poQ 05 1U9UIOUJ qo^Each precept the Savior has 

•9Aoj given, 

jo *uids e qjiAV pgqDuuEndeavoring in meekness to 

4 u9Ai29q make 

jo diqsjoAV 9qi joj p9u3is9Diurnal advances to heaven. 

My Schooling and Springville Academy. 

In the intervals of the three schools I taught 
in Cattaraugus County, I attended a small 
academy in the little village of Springville, 
Erie County, New York, at three different 
times, amounting in all to less than half a year. 
That constituted my public schooling. I paid 
my tuition by ringing the bell and sweeping 
the floors. During the last term I boarded 
myself in my room in the building. My staple 
articles of diet were bread, rolls, and potatoes 
roasted in the coals of my fireplace, and I 

18 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

would sometimes pick up the sticks to make the 
fire. The cost of living was less then than it 
is now, or I could not have lived on less than 
half a dollar per week, as I did then. True, 
my living was rather frugal, but my report of 
class-standing was quite satisfactory; it placed 
my name within three of the head of the list. 
I continued my habits of study alone, without 
a teacher, without assistance of any kind other 
than from a few books, and those often bor- 
rowed from neighbors, and by the light from 
the large stone fireplace in our small, one-room 
log shanty. 

Teaching in Grand Rapids and Studying 

Law. 

In the fall of 1842 my mother and family 
moved to Michigan and settled in Grand Rap- 
ids, which was then a live and growing village. 
There were tw T o or three select schools and 
one district school in the place. I taught the 
district school that winter, and boarded around. 
The incoming families at that time from all 
directions and of many nationalities brought 

*9 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

a strange medley of scholars together, to the 
number sometimes of sixty to seventy in the 
one schoolroom. They brought the school- 
books which were used in the places from which 
they came, and they formed a strange collec- 
tion. The work of aggregating and classify- 
ing the scholars and books taxed my ingenuity 
to the utmost. There was no law in Michigan 
then by which the grading and selecting of 
classes and books could be made. Among the 
reading books that were brought I counted thir- 
teen different kinds; of grammars, six; and of 
other books in proportion. Besides the nu- 
merous classes from the alphabet up through 
the primary English branches there was a class 
in Natural Philosophy (Comstock's), one in 
Astronomy (Burritt's Geography of the 
Heavens), and one in Surveying (Flint's) ; so 
I was kept busy that winter day and night. 

In the spring I entered as a student in the 
law office of Martin & Johnson in Grand Rap- 
ids. Mr. Johnson was soon after appointed a 
Federal officer to one of the West India Islands, 
and Mr. Martin was later Justice of the Su- 

20 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

prcmc Court of Michigan. A fellow student in 
the office was S. L. Withey, who afterward be- 
came a prominent lawyer and judge. 

During that summer court was being held 
in Grand Rapids, and a case for jury trial was 
called, when it was learned that the jury lacked 
one of the required number. The sheriff 
glanced over the crowd and, seeing me, called 
my name. Not willing to give the audience 
my reason for declining, and supposing that 
when I went forward some lawyer who knew 
me would object and I would step aside, I went 
forward, and, no objection being made, I was 
seated with the jury. The case was heard and 
the jury was sent to their room in the after- 
noon. We began discussing the case imme- 
diately, but soon found that we could not agree ; 
so in the evening our conversation drifted to 
other themes: to the coming election, politics, 
etc. It was then learned that I was not yet a 
voter; so the foreman at once called the officer 
and sent word to the judge that there was an 
infant on the jury and we could not agree, 
whereupon the judge called the jury out and 

21 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

dismissed us. That was the most I ever had 
to do with a jury trial. 

I made my home that summer with my 
cousin, Porter Reed, a farmer living about a 
mile from the Rapids. At times as I was able 
I would assist him on his farm. It was while 
here that I read those masterly and funda- 
mental works on Common Law, viz. : " Black- 
stone's Commentaries" and "Kent's Commen- 
taries," from which I have received assistance 
in my ministry in various ways, and would rec- 
ommend every young preacher to read them, 
especially the first-named. 

From his central spiritual home in the- 
ology, where the young preacher is supposed 
to be a familiar resident, he may make excur- 
sions out in the direction of history, philosophy, 
and science, if only he will be sure to return 
home for nights and Sundays. And many of 
our preachers would be more useful and their 
services more in demand by the people if they 
were better acquainted with the great facts of 
Law and Nature which lie close around their 
spiritual dwelling-place. 

22 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

My Last School and Change of Life- 
work. 

In the winter of 1843-4 I taught the school 
in the town of Otisco, Ionia County, Michigan. 
It w T as the fifth and last public school that I 
taught. It was in a new country, and when 
I went up to commence my school I found the 
people building the schoolhouse, which was not 
yet finished. So for a week or two I taught 
with saw and hammer, trusting to make my 
mark on their institution of learning, if no- 
where else. Though the country was new and 
the community new T , yet the school was in some 
respects the most interesting one that I had 
taught. Some of the scholars had been teach- 
ers, several of them were older than myself, 
and a more general desire for learning was 
manifest than I had ever seen in any school. 
I adopted the practice of giving at different 
times through the day short talks upon themes 
of general interest, though not connected di- 
rectly with their text-books. The interest these 
talks awakened was gratifying, and often the 
parents would attend them, which served to 

23 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

strengthen the attachment of the scholars to 
the school. 

There were other considerations besides 
the character of the school, which gave that 
winter an unusual place in my memory. One 
was the very serious thoughts that w r ould per- 
sist in coming to my mind as to my plan for 
my life-work. It was now four years since 
my conversion, and the experiences of those 
years gave me new viewpoints. From the very 
first of my religious life, Christians and some- 
times ministers would speak to me about 
preaching the gospel; sometimes it would be 
but a casual allusion, and sometimes an earnest 
appeal. But it served to keep the subject be- 
fore my mind, and often led to a comparison 
between the legal profession and the Christian 
ministry, with a growing tendency in favor of 
the latter. 

During that winter the religious condition 
of the people in the new countries appealed to 
me as never before. They would hear a ser- 
mon from their circuit-preacher once in two 
or four weeks, and generally at its close he 

24 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

would leap into his saddle and start for his 
next appointment, perhaps five to ten miles 
away. But few, if any, religious meetings 
would be held in the intervals. I would often 
be asked to read a sermon to the people or 
give an exhortation or hold a prayer-meeting. 
In responding to their requests I found that 
many more people were interested in religion 
than was supposed. And further, I found that 
my personal experiences while leading these 
meetings were such as to lift me to realms of 
clearer vision and to broaden my ideas of life's 
demands upon me. These two great facts : the 
religious needs of the world around me, and my 
personal obligations to choose the highest and 
best plan for my life-work, held debate in my 
mind until, at the close of my school, I was 
prepared to say to my friends and to the 
Church, "If I am wanted as a herald of sal- 
vation to lost men, here am I; send me." 

The closing day of my school in Otisco was 
one of peculiar interest. The house was filled 
with scholars, their parents, and neighbors, 
and many and tender were the expressions of 

25 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

appreciation given. The scholars — all who 
could write — had written to me a personal let- 
ter expressing their pleasure in the work and 
privileges of the school, and as they passed 
out of the house they placed them in my hands. 
Some were in verse, among which was one from 
a young lady of Christian experience and who 
had been a teacher. The first and the last 
stanzas were as follows: 

" Adieu, kind sir, we now must part, 
Keen anguish fills the aching heart. 
No more your voice in school we hear, 
No more your counsels greet our ear. 



Go then, dear friend, your Maker calls, 
Go sound the trump from Zion's walls. 
The work is great, the work is good, 
To call lost sinners home to God." 

On my return to Grand Rapids I called at 
the law-office and told my preceptors that I 
had concluded to make a change in my text- 
books; that in place of Commentaries upon 
Common Law by Blackstone and Kent, I would 
take Commentaries upon the Divine Law by 
Clarke and Henry, and in place of Chittie's 
"Pleadings" I would take Fletcher's "Appeal 

26 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

to Matter of Fact and Common Sense. " In 
other words, I had concluded that, rather than 
place myself where I would often be tempted 
to clear the guilty or to convict the innocent, 
I would spend my life in preaching the gospel 
of salvation to all mankind. I was gratified 
at the approval which the attorneys expressed 
at my change of plan. Soon as my new pur- 
pose was made known to Rev. Franklin Gage, 
preacher in charge of the Grand Rapids Cir- 
cuit, he set me at work at different points of 
his vast charge till the meeting of his next 
Quarterly Conference, which occurred June 15, 
1844, Rev. Larmon Chatfield presiding. That 
was the last session of Quarterly Conference 
of the old Grand Rapids Circuit. One act of 
that last session was to license me as a local 
preacher and recommend me to the Michigan 
Annual Conference for admission on trial. 

First Conference and Circuit. 

That Annual Conference was held that fall 
in Coldwater, with Bishop Leonidas L. Ham- 
line presiding. The coming of this man of great 

29 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

reputation, and especially his sermon on Sunday 
morning, produced a profound impression. 
His text was, "Blessed are the pure in heart, 
for they shall see God." He unfolded the sub- 
ject by answering three questions: What is 
heart-purity? Is heart-purity attainable in this 
life? What are its blessings? 

The theme was so lucidly presented that it 
became my theological compend on that subject 
to this day. 

That was the first Conference of ministers 
I had ever seen, and my impression of them 
was that they -were great and good men, and 
my first impression has not been qualified much 
by subsequent acquaintance with them. Some 
of the members of that Conference who live 
in my memory are Colclazer, Pilcher, Staples, 
Richards, Crippen, Bush, Gage, Chatfield, Er- 
canbrack, Bibbins, Billings, Collins, Champion, 
Smith, Chaplin, Davidson, Baughman, and 
many others whose names are written in the 
"Lamb's Book of Life." 

I and some other young preachers were 
billeted with some farmers' families about four 

30 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

miles from the village. In the evenings we 
would hold meetings in that neighborhood. 
There I first heard John Russell preach. His 
text was Rom. 8:13: "For if ye live after the 
flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit 
do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." 
The sermon would have done honor to a doctor 
of divinity or a bishop. 

At that Conference the Grand Rapids Cir- 
cuit was divided, the village becoming a station, 
with A. M. Fitch appointed, and the circuit 
taking the name of Flat River, with David 
Whitlock and Seth Reed appointed. Brother 
Whitlock, a blessed man of God, preached but 
twice after Conference, when he was seized 
with pneumonia and died. That left me alone 
on the circuit during the year. It was an im- 
mense charge, embracing all of Montcalm 
County (which was then settled) , part of Ionia 
County, nearly all of Kent, and part of Ottawa 
Counties. I went around once in four weeks, 
preaching regularly twenty to twenty-four times 
a month, as sometimes a new neighborhood 
would move into the woods since my last visit. 

31 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

I heard of a camp of lumbermen in the pine- 
woods where the city of Greenville now stands, 
and went up and preached to them one evening 
in one of their shanties. It was the first ser- 
mon ever preached in Greenville, if not the 
first in Montcalm County. 

The experience I gained that year was valu- 
able to me, though gained under difficulties. 
I succeeded well with my Conference studies, 
though my saddle was my principal place of 
study and my saddlebags contained my library. 
The salaries of Methodist preachers at that 
time were fixed by the Discipline at $100 for 
a single man and $200 for a married man; and 
if any one should receive in excess of these 
amounts, he was to pay it over to the Confer- 
ence, to be divided among those who had re- 
ceived less than those amounts. I received 
and reported for that year's work $118, but 
I was never asked to refund the excess. I fan- 
cied that some of the younger brethren felt a 
little jealous because I had received so much — 
but maybe not. I am sure, however, that after 
that year I had plenty of opportunities to apply 

32 




John Russell and Seth Reed. 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

the little excess of my salary that year to the 
great deficiencies in future years, for it was 
many years before I received again my full 
Disciplinary allowance. 

An amusing incident occurred one day as 
I was riding in the woods in Ottawa County. 
I was reading Fletcher's "Appeal to Matter of 
Fact and Common Sense/' a work on Human 
Depravity, preparing for my examination at 
the next Conference. My horse's bridle lay 
upon her neck as she walked slowly along. A 
tree had broken from a high stump on one side 
of the road and had lodged on the other side, 
being about as high as my head. I did not see 
the tree until my head struck it, when I and 
my saddlebags were scraped off on to the 
ground. My horse seemed to think it a joke, 
and she capered and galloped through the 
woods to a log-house where I was accustomed 
to preach, and Mr. Stoddard, who lived there, 
put the horse in the stable and told his wife 
to get a chicken ready, for Brother Reed was 
coming from somewhere; and I trudged on 
with my saddlebags on my arm, to find a hearty 

35 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

welcome and good dinner. Then I resumed 
my ride and my study of "Matter of Fact and 
Common Sense," having had such an impress- 
ive illustration. 

Michigan Conference in 1845, AND 
Mapleton Circuit. 

The session of the Michigan Conference in 
1845 was * n Detroit, in the old State Capital 
Building, near State Street, presided over by 
the eloquent Bishop Janes. Here I passed my 
first examination in my Conference studies, un- 
der Revs. Simonds, Richards, and Harrison. 
The class at first consisted of twenty-four in 
number, but some fell out the first year. 

My second appointment was to the Maple- 
ton Circuit, with Rev. Samuel Bessey as 
preacher in charge. It embraced parts of Clin- 
ton, Shiawassee, and Ingham Counties, with 
headquarters at Rochester Colony, a rural 
neighborhood in the northeast corner of the 
circuit. It was largely a wilderness country. 
Often there were stretches of several miles 
through woods without a house. One day I 

36 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

rode some six miles south from Dewitt, and 
came to the home of a family named Page. 
Father Page said to me, "If you will stay over 
night with us I will go to my nearest neighbor, 
two miles from here, and get some hay for 
your horse.' I thanked him, but dined with 
his family, and rode on several miles to another 
clearing. That man Page then lived where the 
city of Lansing now stands. 

I was walking alone one day on the Grand 
River Road and saw off to my right, coming 
towards the road, two bears: an old one and 
her cub. As they came near, the view was 
obscured by bushes that grew beside the road, 
so that the bears could not see me, neither 
could I see them until they crowded through 
the bushes into the road, which happened to 
be within a few feet of where I stood. We 
both expressed surprise: she by standing up 
on her hind legs and opening her mouth wide, 
and I by standing up on all my legs and open- 
ing my eyes wide. We were both interested: 
I in studying natural history, and she, I sup- 
pose, in studying theology. While we thus 

37 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

stood gazing at each other, the young bear ran 
up a tree that stood near,^and the old one 
turned and ran into the woods as though she 
was disgusted with her observer. In a few 
minutes a man came along, walking with a cane 
which was also a gun; with it he shot the cub, 
which fell dead to the ground. So I escaped 
with a thankful heart and a good story to tell. 
One very stormy day in that winter I called 
at the house of a Scotchman, whom I found to 
be an intelligent man. He had cleared a little 
place in the woods, where he had built his 
house, though yet unfinished. In the cracks 
and corners I saw a few books stowed away, 
doubtless awaiting a better place. In one of 
them (I do not remember the title nor the 
author) I read a passage which stayed in my 
memory, and stays there yet. It was as fol- 
lows: "We behold a great Rock uplifted by 
some mighty power from the bosom of the 
ocean and raised above the level of the ad- 
jacent shore. Crowds line the beach to gaze 
upon the wonder. Soon we see an individual 
put off in a little shallop and, inviting the at- 

38 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

tention of the throng to the wonders he is about 
to effect, rows out to the rock. He strips off 
his outer garments, drags from his boat a little 
hammer, and begins pounding away upon the 
mighty mass of granite. He smites with great 
vigor, perspires profusely, and seems to be 
doing great execution. His friends wonder 
that the rock does not sink forthwith beneath 
his prodigious strokes. Anxiously they await 
his return; but on his quietly coming he has 
nothing to show but a broken hammer and 
bruised knuckles. Great disappointment is felt 
by his friends, but it is brief. Soon another 
and another, and Hume and Payne and Volney 
and Voltaire and Bolingbroke have gone on the 
same errand, and with like success. Their 
friends have in turn encouraged them by shout- 
ing, 'The Rock is surely sinking;' 'It is certainly 
cracked through;' 4 It is on its last legs.' But 
there the Rock stands, with most provoking 
stability, rather benefited than injured by the 
pounding it has received, since by this some 
seaweeds and shells, which had attached them- 
selves to its sides, have been knocked off, and 

39 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

the real grain of the Rock made to appear 
more clearly." 

A pleasant year was spent on the Mapleton 
Circuit, though there was no great revival. 
Some of the most genuine and lovely Christians 
of all my acquaintance lived upon that charge. 
My salary for the year, including hay, oats, 
socks, mittens, and cash, amounted to $59.56. 

Marriage and Bennington Circuit. 

At the close of my second year as proba- 
tioner in the Conference I was received to mem- 
bership at its session in Marshall, ordained 
deacon, and appointed to Bennington Circuit, 
in Shiawassee County. It was a two-weeks' 
circuit, my appointments being for one Sunday 
at Owosso, Dewey's, and Castles, and for the 
other Sunday at Gale's, Hinkley's, and Kel- 
logg's, with occasional appointments through 
the week. Before reaching my circuit I rode 
to Hadley, Lapeer County, and was married 
to Miss Harriet Newell Russell, the scholar 
who the last day of my school in Otisco wrote 
the lines in regard to my call to the ministry. 

40 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

For more than fifty-one years she was my min- 
istering angel as well as my God-given com- 
panion, and the noble mother of my four chil- 
dren. On the 13th of February, 1898, she 
passed to her heavenly home, and her body 
sleeps in the Glenwood Cemetery, in Flint, 
Michigan. 

My children are all yet living: E. Roscoe, 
in Detroit; Louise M. Stowell, in Lowell, 
Mass.; Wilbur F., in Cheboygan, Mich.; and 
H. Ella Baldwin, in Flint. 

My two years on the Bennington Circuit 
were prosperous years, attended with a good 
revival spirit. In the summer of 1848 Rev. 
Manasseh Hickey and I rode up to the Saginaw 
Valley, where, with two or three other preach- 
ers, we held an Indian camp-meeting on the 
banks of the Cass River, near where the village 
of Bridgeport now stands. It was my first ex- 
perience in a meeting of Indians for worship, 
though in later years, when a presiding elder, 
I had an Indian village as one of the appoint- 
ments on my district. At this meeting there 
were probably six or seven hundred Indians, 

41 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

a majority of whom had professed conversion. 
In their worship they were very zealous and 
demonstrative. Their class-leaders and local 
preachers would set a good example to our 
people by their zeal and activities. In their 
worship they were reverent and orderly; no 
whispering or laughing or gazing about, either 
before, during, or after service. They listened 
attentively to the preaching, and would often 
show their appreciation by a loud Amen. In 
my first sermon to them I happened to select 
a text which appealed to their love of figurative 
language, viz. : "They that wait upon the Lord 
shall renew their strength, they shall mount up 
with wings as eagles," etc.; and while I was 
describing the habits of the eagle fixing his 
eyes upon the bright sun, and soaring aloft far 
beyond the gaze of men, the audience uttered 
their shouts like the u noise of many waters." 
I had to stand awhile without speaking, as I 
could not be heard, when suddenly Brother 
Hickey, who sat directly behind me on the plat- 
form, uttered a roar such as I never heard 
before or since. Startled, I looked back and 

42 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

saw him with mouth wide open, arms and legs 
extended, shouting with all his might at every 
breath. The whole audience caught the spirit 
and let loose their voices in billows of praise 
the like of which I never expect to hear till 
I hear them on the other shore. 

One day during preaching service an old 
pagan chief, Ocquawazans, walked on to the 
ground with the bearing of a king. He was 
dressed fantastically, with hawks' bills and 
deer's hoofs hanging about him, with his bow 
and arrow at his back. Our presiding elder, 
George Bradley, was a large man; our mission- 
ary to the Indians, George Brown, was a small 
man. He knew the old chief, and went to him 
and invited him to come forward and be seated 
and hear the preaching. Ocquawazans stood 
motionless, not deigning to notice him, but 
finally said, with emphasis, "Go, tell your big 
men I am here." Brother Brown came back 
to the stand and reported to Brother Bradley, 
who went and invited him, and he came right 
forward in all his dignity and sat down and 
was a close listener all through the meeting. 

43 



THE STORY OF xMY LIFE 

It was the custom of the Indians to give 
a name to a white preacher who came to them, 
which name would indicate some peculiar thing 
about the preacher that would strike the Indian 
mind. Thus Brother Chatfield had a high, full 
forehead and somewhat stooping shoulders, 
and his Indian name meant "Projecting 
Heavens;" Brother Hickey's name very appro- 
priately meant "The Thunderer." When I 
closed my sermon and stepped down from the 
stand, their leaders came and gave me my 
name, which meant "Straight Up Through the 
Sky." 

At the close of the camp-meeting we held 
a council with the chiefs and leaders. It was 
held in one of their wigwams, all sitting on 
the ground: they on one side, and we on the 
other. First an Indian arose and spoke, then 
he came and shook hands with us, and returned 
to his seat. Then one of us would speak; then 
another Indian would follow in the same way 
as the first, until all in the wigwam had 
spoken. The last to speak was the old pagan 
chief, who said: "You white men have two 

44 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

ears and one heart, and what I say I want 
should go into both your ears and down into 
your heart. You fathers have boys, and you 
love your boys. When your boys go away 
from you, you do n't feel bad, for they take 
a paper and write on it, and send it to you, 
and it tells you where your boys are and how 
they are, and your hearts are glad. Now, we 
Indians have boys up in the woods, and we 
love our boys just as you do yours. But when 
they go away from us we are sad. Now I tell 
you what we want: We want you to send us 
a teacher, so when our boys go away they can 
write on a paper, and that will come to us 
and tell us where they are and how they are, 
and it will make our poor old hearts glad. 
Send us a teacher. I do n't say now that we 
will take his religion, but we will watch him." 
We promised him, and the Conference fulfilled 
our promise. 

On our way to the Conference of 1848 
three of us rode horseback in company: Eli 
Westlake, Thomas Wakelin, and myself; each 
riding a large, fine horse (and I would not 

45 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

advise any Methodist preacher to own any 
other kind). We had to cross Grand River in 
a part of the State where sawmills had not yet 
been built. The bridge across the river was 
made of tamarack poles, built high to avoid 
the spring swellings of the river, and com- 
mencing far back from the shores to secure the 
utmost level to the bridge. The abutments were 
square pens built of poles, with larger poles 
for stringers, reaching from one pen to an- 
other, and the whole covered by the tamarack 
poles. Riding in single file across this bridge, 
my horse first, and Brother Wakelin's next, the 
poles under his horse's hind feet rolled, and 
he, struggling, fell to the bottom of the pen, 
some seven or eight feet deep, but fortunately 
it was the last pen before coming to the water. 
I rode on through the woods and found a man 
who would come with an ax and chop the 
horse out. No serious injury resulted to the 
horse or to any of us. But we were intensely 
interested, and our activities were varied while 
at work, to find ourselves in the presence of a 
swarm of yellow wasps whose home we had 

4 6 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

thoughtlessly broken up, and they seemed de- 
lighted in impressing their inverted blessings 
on us. 

In those years the road from Flint to Sagi- 
naw led through wilderness and swamps much 
of the way. Large logs would be cut and laid 
across the swamps to form the roadbeds. 
Sometimes they would be covered by earth, 
which would make quite a passable road; but 
if left bare, they were terrors to the traveler. 
They were called "corduroys." One of those 
logways on the Saginaw road was said to be 
six miles long, of large logs, and uncovered. 
At the close of the Conference that fall the 
bishop was re-ading out the appointments, which 
was the last item of Conference business. In 
those days no preacher was supposed to know 
where he was to go till his name was read off 
by the bishop. My presiding elder chanced to 
sit directly in front of me, and he turned and 
whispered, u You are going to Saginaw Mis- 
sion." I answered in whisper, "I can not move 
my wife over that six-mile corduroy." He 
started to the bishop's chair and whispered to 

47 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

him. I saw him take his pen and write, and 
then he read on, and soon read, "Saginaw Mis- 
sion, Andrew Bell; Genesee Circuit, Seth 
Reed." I do not know whether my eldest 
daughter ever knew how she helped the bishop 
in making his appointments that fall. 

Genesee, Mt. Clemens, and Pontiac. 

Genesee was a large circuit, nearly in the 
middle of which was Flint as a station, with 
M. B. Camburn, a single man, as the preacher; 
and with me on the circuit was Orrin Whit- 
more, a single man, as junior preacher. Dur- 
ing the year Brother Whitmore was married 
to Miss Adams, and Brother Camburn to Miss 
Clark, both ladies members of our Church on 
my circuit 

A blessed revival was enjoyed that year, 
especially at Flushing, where persons were con- 
verted who became prominent workers in the 
cause, some of whom continue to this day. At 
Flushing I held the sad funeral services of our 
talented, consecrated missionary to the Indians, 
Rev. Lovell Harris. The band of which he 

48 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

had charge, and with whom he died, was about 
sixteen miles below Flushing, on the banks of 
the Flint River. Almost the entire band came 
up with his body to the funeral, and a more 
weeping and stricken congregation I never saw. 
When the body was lowered in the grave they 
fell upon their knees, weeping aloud and pray- 
ing, "O Great Father in heaven, please send 
us another missionary just like Brother Har- 
ris!" 

My next appointment was to Mt. Clemens, 
which, though much smaller than any I had yet 
served, was considered a promotion, because it 
was called a station. We arrived at the place 
on Saturday, and finding no provision for re- 
ceiving us, we went to the hotel. Early the 
next week my wife was taken suddenly and 
seriously ill with hemorrhage of the stomach, 
and could not be moved from the hotel for 
some days, and when we did move her, she 
still being very sick, our hotel-bill was pre- 
sented. Not having a dollar in the world to 
pay on the bill or on anything else, with my 
wife in such condition, with two little children 

49 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

on my hands, and among entire strangers, I 
had, I think, what people call "the blues." I 
finally stated my circumstances to a few of my 
people, and they rallied to my help. It was 
a year of anxiety to us, as Mrs. Reed's health 
continued poor for a long time. Yet it was 
a year of material prosperity to the society, 
principally from one circumstance. Our house 
of worship was an old, unattractive building 
at the edge of the village. The Presbyterians 
had a few years before built and furnished a 
good church in a central part of the town. But 
their people had failed to pay their minister 
his salary, so the church had been locked for 
more than a year, till finally it went into the 
hands of the sheriff for public sale. On the 
morning of the day of the sale the president 
of their board of trustees, Judge Thurston, 
came to our house and told me that their people 
wished we would buy their property at private 
sale. I asked him their price, and he said, "We 
will sell the church and all the furniture for 
just what we owe our pastor, viz. : $450." 
Said I: "We will take it. Go, tell the sheriff 

50 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

the sale is off." And he hustled to tell him, 
and I hustled to tell my trustees that the sale 
was on — on me. Soon as possible the trustees 
met and assumed the contract I had made. 
Mr. John Stevens, a business man and a friend 
of our Church, though not a member, advanced 
what money we needed, and the price was paid 
and the deed taken before many of the people 
knew what was going on. We moved into the 
church and held service there the next Sabbath. 
Soon we sold our old church to the Catholics 
for $500, and the margin easily paid our mov- 
ing-expenses, and we found ourselves well es- 
tablished. Our people are worshiping on that 
spot to-day, and there is probably no better 
church-site in the city. Some years ago they 
moved off the building which they purchased, 
and built a beautiful brick structure in its place. 
In the fall of 1850 I was appointed to 
Pontiac. I found the membership in good con- 
dition; revival interests began early and con- 
tinued through the year. In some of the neigh- 
borhoods adjoining the city there were blessed 
revivals. During the year a public donation 

5i 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

was given to us, which excelled in its gifts any 
such party ever made to us during my ministry. 
It was expected by myself and the people that 
I should be returned for the second year, but 
the authorities decided otherwise, and I was 
sent to Ypsilanti. 

Ypsilanti and Monroe. 

I think the most genuine and far-reaching 
revival that has ever occurred under my minis- 
try was realized at Ypsilanti. From it about 
sixty were received to membership in the 
Church, a large proportion of them being 
young persons from about sixteen to thirty 
years of age. Of the number several became 
prominent workers and ministers. John W. 
Crippen was a useful member of Detroit Con- 
ference until his death, October 16, 1909, and 
Wm. H. Shier, D. D., is still an honorable and 
useful member. 

The religious interest seemed to grow 
through the two years. The large auditorium 
was usually filled on Sundays, but there was no 
smaller room for religious and social work. So 

52 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

during the second year additional rooms were 
built at the rear of the church, which met the 
great need. 

A very important event in the history of 
Ypsilanti occurred while I was there, in the 
building of the first normal school in the State. 
It was dedicated on the fifth of October, 1852, 
the Hon. John D. Pierce, Michigan's first su- 
perintendent of public instruction, delivering 
the address, the writer of these lines making 
the dedicatory prayer, and Superintendent of 
Public Instruction Sherman conducting the 
dedicatory services. In the afternoon Judge 
Ross Wilkins, of Detroit, gave a masterly ad- 
dress. At that time the Michigan State Teach- 
ers' Association was organized, which was con- 
tinued to the present day and has grown to 
such proportions and has accomplished such 
work as to entitle it to the praise of all edu- 
cators of the State. I had so recently been a 
school-teacher myself that they easily counted 
me in. So I assisted in organizing the associ- 
ation. At the celebration fifty years after the 
dedication of the normal I responded to a re- 

53 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

quest and made the opening prayer on that oc- 
casion. 

At the Monroe church I found a very high 
pulpit, reached by winding stairs, between the 
two front doors; and standing in front of the 
pulpit, and very near to it, was a large stove 
with the pipes running around the room — the 
only method of warming the house. My first 
day's experience resulted in a sickness which 
lasted for weeks. But it was not lost time to 
the charge, for my people rallied with great 
promptness and unanimity, and by the time I 
had recovered they had removed the old stove 
and pipes, and placed a furnace in the base- 
ment; had taken down the pulpit, and built an 
appropriate one in the rear of the room; had 
taken out and reversed all the pews; had re- 
moved entirely the old high galleries built near 
the ceiling, and in various ways improved the 
house, so it was a pleasant place of worship. 
The people were kind and loyal; but reverses 
came to the place, which affected the Churches 
seriously. A line of steamboats from Buffalo 
to the Upper Lakes, which had for many years 

54 



i 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

touched at Monroe, was discontinued at that 
place, and consequently a branch of the Michi- 
gan Southern Railroad, which had been built 
to the wharf connecting with the boats, was 
taken up. The result was an immense hegira 
of families from Monroe to other parts. 
Added to this, during my second year a wave 
of cholera swept through the town, which was 
no respecter of persons. Among those I was 
called to bury were several of my most useful 
people. The panic in the town was great, and 
sometimes there would be scarcely enough 
people present at a funeral to bury the dead. 
Once the undertaker had to go out and solicit 
help. By removals and death we lost from our 
Church during my term sixty-four members, 
and gained less than half that number. But 
though cast down, our people were not for- 
saken, and their seasons of worship were sea- 
sons of refreshing from the presence of the 
Lord. From that small society and Sunday- 
school several persons have gone out to do 
good service in the great field. Among the 
boys in the Sunday-school was one of marked 

55 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

peculiarity, George A. Custer, who afterward 
became noted in the United States Army. 
While his deportment in church or Sunday- 
school would be so nearly respectful that it 
could not well be reproved, yet it was so sly 
and concealed that he w r ould plan fun for a 
half dozen other boys older and larger than 
he to execute, while he would look sober as 
a deacon. Sometimes in prayer-meeting we 
could hear, but could not see, small birdshot 
snapped from the thumb-nails of the boys, and 
rebounding over the uncarpeted floor, while not 
a smile would appear on the face of any of 
them. We knew who was the promoter of 
such schemes, for George was easily their 
leader. 

Ann Arbor and Port Huron. 

In 1855 I was appointed to the Ann Arbor 
Church. My embarrassment almost overcame 
me in being placed in such a responsible posi- 
tion, while my privileges of education had been 
so meager. But as the responsibility of my 
appointment was not my own, I resolved not 

56 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

to be responsible for a failure; so I would do 
my very best. Many of the university students 
were in my congregation, and some of the lead- 
ing professors, such as Alexander Winchell 
and E. O. Haven, afterward bishop, from 
whose friendship I received valuable aid. I 
recollect asking Professor Winchell to ride with 
me out to Northfield one day and address a 
gathering of district schools; he did so in a 
very happy manner, and while returning he 
told me that was the first public address he 
had ever given. It was certainly the beginning 
of very popular public addresses and lectures. 
A good revival spirit prevailed in the Church, 
also a zeal for material development. A new 
parsonage was built the first year, and the 
church was enlarged the second year. During 
this term my wife suffered a protracted and 
severe sickness, so severe that the neighbors 
would ask, u Is she yet living ?" And while she 
was thus apparently at death's door, our young- 
est child was born and the mother recovered, 
to be a blessing to her family and to others for 
many years. 

57 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

At the Conference held in Port Huron in 
1857 a gracious revival began during its ses- 
sion and continued with great power through 
the Conference and for months into the year. 
The change of ministers and my moving and 
settling did not seem to dissipate the revival 
spirit. During eight months of the first year 
the Church doubled its membership. During 
the second year the people bought a lot and 
built a parsonage. When it was completed, 
and before we moved in, a banquet was held 
one afternoon and evening. A carriage came 
for us towards evening, and we were driven to 
the new house and were entertained in the 
dining-room and kitchen till after supper was 
passed, when we went into the other rooms 
and found all our household goods there and 
beds set up for the family to occupy for the 
night. Busily had the crowd worked while 
some of them had beguiled us in ignorance of 
what the rest were doing. Thus unexpectedly 
did we spend our first night in the new par- 
sonage, and the people w r ere all the while being 
drawn nearer to us by their kindness. In a 

58 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

very short time they put our goods in place, 
and we commenced a short but happy residence 
there. 

I taught a large Bible-class in my church 
on week-day evenings. One dark Saturday 
evening our doorbell was rung as I was in my 
study in the chamber. Our large Scotch girl 
opened the door and saw the faces of a crowd 
of people upon the veranda, and was fright- 
ened, and, running upstairs, called to me, and 
went and hid. I went down, and my Bible-class 
filed into the parlor to its filling. After a few 
pleasant remarks they placed in Mrs. Reed's 
hand a well-filled purse, and in mine a watch, 
which is in my pocket now, which has always 
looked to me beautiful, and which has faith- 
fully ticked off my hours and minutes from that 
evening to this. God bless the people whose 
kindness makes their minister happy! — and He 
does. 

In many places where the population is 
miscellaneous, coming together from all quar- 
ters of the globe, and before facilities for wor- 
ship are established, there is apt to be more or 

59 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

less lawlessness in religious worship, and the 
leaders thereof have a great responsibility in 
controlling the ungodly elements. Sometimes 
I was at my wits' end to thwart the plans of 
some clique that I could discover. One method 
was to put the meeting in charge of some one 
else for the time being, and go among the 
people and get into a pleasant conversation 
with one of the evil designers and manage to 
learn either his name or the name of some 
other one of his company. I would then let 
him see me take out my tablet and write, or 
appear to write. He would catch the idea, and 
soon they would be passing the whisper along 
and would take their hats and leave. At one 
neighborhood the preaching was in a school- 
house; the desk was between the two front 
doors, and a long bench ran across the room 
at the rear. This bench was usually occupied 
by a number of full-grown young men and 
women who during service would conduct them- 
selves lawlessly. I spoke to them occasionally 
in the best manner of which I was capable, but 
to no effect. One morning after preaching I 

60 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

requested the audience to resume their seats 
after the benediction. They did so, and looked 
and listened intently. I then rehearsed the 
situation and alluded to the sorrow which had 
been expressed to me by the neighbors and par- 
ents of these young people. I then said: "You 
have probably noticed that for two or three 
Sabbaths I have not alluded to their conduct, 
though it has been no better. On the north 
part of my circuit I was preaching one evening, 
and there was a young man who acted very 
much as these young people have acted, only 
he was alone in his actions. Though he dis- 
turbed me, yet I did not rebuke him, as no one 
seemed to be affected by him. After the service 
some of the men said to me they were glad 
I did not reprove the young man, for he is an 
idiot. I have since conversed with some of the 
men of this community, and it is their opinion 
that none of these young people are idiots. If 
the neighbors are mistaken, the future conduct 
of the young people will show it." I heard no 
more from these young people till after some 
years, when a gentleman called on me and 

61 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

stated that he was one of the young people 
that I reproved, and though the reproof was 
sharp, yet it was deserved, and he thanked me 
for it and said he was ashamed of his conduct. 
Yesterday, October 6, 19 13, I was in De- 
troit with quite a number of our ministers, 
among whom was Brother J. B. Oliver, one 
of our retired ministers, who, on seeing me, 
remarked to the company, "I have been think- 
ing about Brother Reed this morning, and the 
thing which suggested his name to me at this 
time was my discovering a hole in my stock- 
ing." That curious remark brought a demand 
from several of the brethren for an explana- 
tion, when Brother Oliver said: "Fifty-five 
years ago a camp-meeting was held in the 
woods near Port Huron. One evening, while 
the congregation was seated, three young ladies 
were seen standing upon a seat. Brother Reed, 
who had charge of the meeting that evening, 
requested them to be seated. They paid no 
attention. Soon he requested again, with in- 
creased emphasis ; but no move. Then, point- 
ing his finger towards them, while all the people 

62 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

looked that way, he said, u If those three young 
ladies standing on a bench near that tree should 
know that there was a hole in any one of their 
stockings they would all go down in their seats 
at once." "And they w r ent down at once," said 
Brother Oliver. 

Woodward and Lafayette. 

At the first meeting of the Official Board of 
Woodward Avenue after Conference, without 
consulting me, my salary was fixed at $1,000, 
being $200 more than they had ever paid, and 
that amount more than any Methodist preacher 
in Michigan was then receiving. It indicated 
the liberality which has ever characterized that 
people. Noble members were in that Church : 
Owen, Preston, Fenton, Fowler, Merrick, Sta- 
ples, Taft, Palmer, and others. 

An interesting circumstance occurred during 
my second year here. Among the members of 
the Church was James Burns, a leading mer- 
chant. His daughter Eliza, a most beautiful 
and educated young lady, was always with the 
family in their pews on Sunday, but was not a 

63 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

Christian; not a member of the Sunday-school. 
She was unhappy, as she afterward said, living 
with no object in life, just floating on the cur- 
rent of time. She longed for a better life, but 
knew not how to come into it. She finally made 
a resolve that she would do the first good thing 
that should come to her mind — a good resolve 
for any one to make. It was not long before 
the good thing appeared: Looking out the win- 
dow upon Congress Street one day, she saw 
some German boys playing, and the thought 
arose in her mind, Do they attend a Sunday- 
school? She immediately went out and asked 
a boy (she could converse in German) if he 
went to a Sunday-school, and he said he did 
not. "Will you go to a Sunday-school if I will 
be your teacher?" she asked; and he said he 
would. Then said she, "Meet me next Sunday 
afternoon at two o'clock at a certain street cor- 
ner." Then she went to other boys, and to 
others, with the same proposition. None of 
her friends knew what she was doing until the 
next Sunday afternoon, just after the large 
school was opened, we were all surprised by 

6 4 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

seeing Eliza Burns walk in, followed by seven- 
teen of those little waifs. We cleared a central 
place for her in the large room, and she sat 
down and began her work. I shall never for- 
get the blush upon her beautiful face as, with 
head bowed over her Testament, she began 
reading and teaching it to those boys. It was 
not long before she became a Christian, and 
later, when Dr. J. M. Buckley was pastor of 
that Church, she became his wife. 

On the subject of slavery several in that 
Church had been quite conservative, but when 
the War of the Rebellion broke out they were 
ready to prove their loyalty as well as declare 
it. Still there was a strong element in the city 
who at first announced their sympathies with 
the South and criticised our Government for 
defending the Union. When Fort Sumter was 
attacked, President Lincoln issued a call for 
75,000 volunteers to go South and put down 
the rebellion. Next morning the Detroit Free 
Press published editorially: "The President has 
called for a volunteer force to go South and 
put down the rebellion; we hope another volun- 

65 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

teer force will be raised to follow them, and 
that there will be a lire in the rear, and that 
such men as Hogarth and Ketchell and Reed 
will be placed where they will receive the first 
fire." The three men named were pastors of 
the Presbyterian, Congregational, and Metho- 
dist Churches. Frequently during the forepart 
of the war, when news of a reverse to our army 
would come, the Free Press would pour out its 
vituperations against the Government. One 
day, when another such attack appeared, as the 
story was told, a Mr. Jackson, who was a 
prominent manufacturer in Detroit, and who 
belonged to the same political party with the 
Free Press, but who was a loyal Democrat, 
said to one of his men, u Go and tell the editor 
that I have two hundred men in my employ, 
and if I see any more such slurs upon the Gov- 
ernment and army as I have seen of late in his 
paper, I shall tell my men to go down and put 
the Detroit Free Press office in Detroit River, 
and that my men always obey me." It was 
observable after that that a change of heart 

66 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

or something else had taken place in the Free 
Press. 

Over forty years ago Hon. Thomas W. 
Palmer, of Detroit, gave, in memory of his 
mother, five thousand dollars to the Superan- 
nuated Preachers' Aid Society of Detroit Con- 
ference, with the stipulation that when any of 
the three ministers: E. H. Pilcher, Samuel 
Clements, and Seth Reed, whom he considered 
special friends of his mother's, should be placed 
upon the retired list, he should receive one- 
third of the annual interest of the above sum 
during the remainder of his life, and after his 
death his dividends should go into the general 
fund of the society. I am now the only re- 
maining one of the three, and annually my 
heart beats with gratitude to that generous 
friend. 

In the fall of 1861 I was appointed to the 
Lafayette Avenue Charge, which was young 
and as yet weak. It has since developed into 
the Tabernacle Church. While here William, 
afterward Bishop, Taylor, who was a kind of 

67 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

self-appointed world's evangelist, would occa- 
sionally call and preach and talk to us while 
crossing the country. His conversations were 
interesting, as he had just returned from 
Africa. One day a telegram was handed to 
him; he read it and casually remarked, "It is 
from my wife, — guess I must send her some 
money." I asked him where she was and how 
long since he had seen her. He said she was 
in California, and it had been about eight years 
since he saw her. Then I remarked, "I sup- 
pose you are on your way there now." "Oh, 
no," said he, "I must go to South America 
first." At family worship that same morning 
he commenced his prayer by thanking the Lord 
for voices of friends around us: "It is the 
sweetest music we hear; and for the light of 
the sun that comes into our eyes and never 
hurts them; and we thank Thee for the air 
which we breathe ; we thank Thee Thou didst 
make it just as Thou didst. If Thou hadst put 
the oxygen and nitrogen together in little differ- 
ent proportions, it would have blown us all to 
pieces." On two different occasions we enter- 

68 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

tained Peter Cartwright over night, and listened 
to his recital of some of the experiences re- 
corded in his autobiography. We had calls also 
from Alfred Bronson, the early pioneer of the 
West, and William Nast, the scholar, the com- 
mentator, and first German convert in America. 
With all his learning he was simple as a child. 
One morning after the opening of the General 
Conference in Philadelphia in 1864 Dr. Nast 
rose to correct an error which appeared in his 
speech in the Daily Advocate of the previous 
day. After making the correction he said, 
"Sometimes I say what I do not mean to say, 
and sometimes I do not say what I mean to 
say, but I never said what I did not say." The 
Conference laughed, and he blushed. 

At Lafayette Avenue a public donation was 
held for us in the auditorium-room of the old 
First Church. Among those present were two 
aged men: Father Mason, an Irish local 
preacher; and General Lewis Cass, who was a 
near neighbor of ours. Mr. Cass was quite 
infirm as well as aged. With his crutch he 
made his way within the chancel rail, and was 

69 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

seated in an easy-chair. He remarked to Father 
Mason, "When you are as old as I am I hope 
you will be smarter than I am." "Indade," 
said Father Mason, "and when you are as old 
as I am I hope you will be as smart as I am." 
This led to a comparison of their ages, when it 
appeared that General Cass was nearly ten 
years younger than the other. 

Ypsilanti, Second Term. 

In 1862 I was appointed to Ypsilanti for 
the second time. During the twelve years since 
my first pastorate marked changes had taken 
place in the congregation and perhaps in my- 
self. Though the congregation had increased 
greatly, yet the revival spirit was not as domi- 
nant as formerly. The people thought I had 
backslidden, and I was sure they had. Several 
circumstances occurred while there which 
served to interrupt the regular course of pas- 
toral labor; among the first was that two 
thieves one night entered our house and stole, 
besides other things, an overcoat and dress- 
coat from rne, and an overcoat and dress-coat 

7° 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

from my son, nearly all being new coats; and 
just before we moved here from Detroit an 
overcoat of mine was stolen from the hall in 
the parsonage there. In regard to the thieves 1 
visit our friends in Ypsilanti made us a good 
donation visit, which enabled me and my son 
to put on coats again. 

The War of the Rebellion continued in full 
force and was, of course, the all-absorbing topic 
in the Nation. The Christian Commission was 
assuming organic form as an agency of im- 
mense usefulness. A telegram came from the 
State commission asking me if I would go into 
that work for a few weeks in the Army of the 
Cumberland. I laid the matter before my Offi- 
cial Board, and they said, "Go, and we will 
take care of things here." I first went to Nash- 
ville, Tennessee, where I spent some weeks. 
Our army had just taken the city. My first 
experience in the work was late in the evening. 
After entering the city I went into a large livery 
barn which was used for a hospital, and which 
was filled with long rows of cots, each bearing 
a sick or wounded soldier. A few candles gave 

7i 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

a weird, dim light, and the groans of the 
wounded broke the oppressive silence. I was 
not anticipating the shock which the scene pro- 
duced upon me, for I had to retreat immedi- 
ately and seek quiet before I could do anything 
for the suffering men. The work of the com- 
mission consisted in caring for the disabled sol- 
diers in every possible way. No help was re- 
alized from the citizens of Nashville, who were 
very bitter in their prejudices. I was told that 
when our forces entered the city, a lady occupy- 
ing a beautiful residence near the sidewalk spit 
upon one of our men as he was passing, and 
the officer in charge saw the act and said, 
"Madam, I will occupy your house as a hospital 
in a few hours/' and he did so. 

President Lincoln, as commander-in-chief 
of the United States Army, had issued an order 
that the slaves belonging to owners engaged in 
the rebellion, who should come within our lines, 
should not be returned to their masters. I saw 
many such slaves coming within our lines. 
Whenever a few would meet, even though 
strangers to each other, they would go down 

72 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

on their knees and hold a prayer-meeting, it 
mattered not where they were. The burden of 
their worship, uttered with mighty voice and 
clapping of hands, was, "Bress de Laud and 
Massa Linkum! Bress de Laud and Massa 
Linkum!" Not as jubilant was the heart of 
Mr. Lincoln in those days. 

One of our Bishops told me that during one 
of those dark periods in the war of the Rebel- 
lion he had occasion to call on Mr. Lincoln on 
business; and as soon as the item of business 
was dismissed he opened his heart to the Bishop 
and told him of the dark clouds that seemed 
to threaten the existence of the Nation as never 
before. He poured out to him the anguish of 
his heart, burdened as no human heart in the 
Nation was burdened. He shook and wept and 
said, "Bishop, won't you pray with me?" They 
knelt, and while the Bishop prayed, Mr. Lin- 
coln groaned and sobbed, and again and again 
ejaculated, "Amen." 

Wherever a number of these freed slaves 
could be gathered, some of those in the Christian 
Commission service would give a few hours in 

73 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

teaching them. I stepped into a church one 
day and found over a hundred of those escaped 
slaves being there taught. I never saw more 
anxiety manifested to learn than I saw there. 
Among them I think there were not a dozen 
who were really black. I spoke with one fine- 
looking middle-aged woman, who presented 
almost no appearance of color, who sat with 
some children of more color, all trying to learn 
to read in the plainest reading. She seemed 
embarrassed and said: "I presume, sir, you are 
surprised to see a person of my age here with 
these children learning to read. But it is the 
privilege I have longed for all my life, and 
now for the first time it has come to me, and 
I must improve it" I heartily approved her 
course and passed on as the tears filled her 
eyes. 

A large, unfinished hotel, called the Zolli- 
coffer House, stood in the city, and our army 
used it as a barracks. One night part of a cap- 
tured regiment of Confederates was brought 
into the city and placed in the barracks; they 

,74 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

occupied all the four floors. Early in the morn- 
ing those on the fourth floor were carousing 
and jumping, when the floor broke, and men, 
brick, and timber came down on to the third 
floor; that broke, and more men, brick, and 
timber came down on to the second floor; that 
broke, and still more men, brick, and timber 
came down on to the first floor. Such a mass, 
I think, was never seen before nor since. Be- 
ing near the building, I hastened with citizens 
and soldiers to help dig out the killed and 
wounded, of which there were about one hun- 
dred. While I was digging with all my might 
at a certain place, from which most pitiful 
groanings came, I soon reached a man wounded 
and bleeding, and asked him who he was. 
"Oh," said he, "I am a Methodist preacher, 
and I wish this thing was ended." "Well," 
said I, "I am a Methodist preacher, and I, too, 
wish this thing was ended." He asked me if 
I could help him to a handkerchief, and I gave 
him mine from my pocket; and he wiped the 
tears and blood from his face, and I turned to 

75 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

help others. The ladies of Nashville came 
with their cordials to comfort their Confeder- 
ate friends. 

After the Battle of Chickamauga I was sent 
to Stevenson, a field hospital in the northeast 
corner of Alabama, to help care for the 
wounded from that battlefield. The Confed- 
erates still held possession of the railroad and 
the river, so our men had to be brought over 
the rocks and mountains some fifty miles in 
ambulances and wagons. As the poor fellows 
would describe their sufferings to me while 
coming over, they must have been awful. 

Providence Conference. 

My second year in Ypsilanti was somewhat 
broken by my absence at General Conference 
in Philadelphia. But while at that Conference 
I made arrangements for a transfer to the 
Providence Conference. This was done on ac- 
count of my wife's health, which was failing 
seriously, and physicians advised a radical 
change of location. 

On my journey to the General Conference 

7 6 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

I passed the cemetery in which my father was 
buried forty years before. It was my first and 
last visit to this lonely place on the Susque- 
hanna. I had searched for the grave a long 
time without finding it, and was about to leave, 
sad and disappointed, when a man approached 
me and, upon learning what I was looking for, 
said, "I can show you the grave, for it was 
I, with my team, that brought your father's 
body from his home in Hartwick to this place 
for burial forty years ago." 

On my return from General Conference I 
surrendered my charge, we packed our belong- 
ings, and moved to the island of Martha's 
Vineyard in the Atlantic Ocean, twenty-five 
miles from the mainland, where I had charge 
of our Church in Edgartown. Faber's first 
sentence in his book, "The Creator and the 
Creature," is, "A man is ever after a different 
man for having seen the ocean." And so the 
privilege to us of spending a year and a half 
surrounded by the great ocean-waves, with all 
her world of mysteries, was very great. And 
with the wealth of ocean we found also wealth 

77 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

of character and Christian experience among 
the island people. Our seasons of worship left 
with us pleasant memories to this day. And 
there, too, I became acquainted with and mem- 
ber of the Martha's Vineyard Camp-meeting, 
which has been called the Mother of New Eng- 
land Camp-meetings; and the memory of those 
ministers I heard preach there will stay with 
me till I meet them again. Little did I think, 
when I first attended that meeting in i860 and 
occupied a little tent, with my straw-bed upon 
the ground, and within a few feet of the first 
cottage ever built upon the ground, a little, 
one-room cottage built of rough boards by 
old Dr. Frederick Upham, that in my day 
Martha's Vineyard Camp-ground would come 
to be the great beautiful Cottage City that it 
is, with its influence reaching across our conti- 
nent. 

In the spring of 1866 I was appointed to 
the Mathewson Street Church, Providence, 
Rhode Island. The pastor who preceded me 
there, Dr. J. H. McCarty, was transferred to 
the Detroit Conference and appointed to a 

78 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

Church which I had served, thus forming 
friendly relations with Churches at a distance 
from each other, a thing which the Methodist 
itinerant system often does. In this case the 
relation is continued by the pastorate of Dr. 
Edward S. Ninde in Mathewson Street Church, 
who formerly belonged to Detroit Conference. 
When E. S. Ninde came into our Confer- 
ence from his school he requested to be sent 
to the most rural point in the Conference. In 
describing to the cabinet one point on my dis- 
trict, the bishop and elders said, "That is the 
place for Eddie Ninde." And he was sent to 
Bay Port. He went as cheerfully as though it 
was the first appointment in the Conference. 
His sister Mary, now Mrs. Gamewell, in 
China, went with him to make him a home. It 
was not long before the hearts of those rural 
people were so bound to them they almost 
thought them to be two angels. At the close 
of the year I wanted to appoint him to a city 
charge on my district, but he said, if he stayed 
on the district at all, he wanted to spend an- 
other year with these people. 

79 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

I have regarded my residence of four years 
in New England as one of the privileges of 
my life. It gave me a higher estimate of those 
institutions, social, intellectual, and religious, 
that have been such mighty factors in the mold- 
ing of our Nation. 

I regret exceedingly that I did not know, 
while residing in Providence, that it had also 
been the residence of one of my direct ances- 
tors, Captain John Reed. He was an officer 
in Oliver Cromwell's Army, and in 1660 came 
to America and settled in Providence, married 
there, and in after years moved to Norwalk, 
Connecticut. He brought with him his sword, 
which was kept in the Reed family for five gen- 
erations. 

My residence in Providence was very pleas- 
ant. I was transferred back to Detroit Con- 
ference in the spring of 1868, but as three or 
four months intervened before the session of 
my Conference, the Temperance Committee of 
Rhode Island engaged me to spend the interval 
in the interests of that cause in that State. I 
selected as my special field the securing of sig- 

80 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

natures of young people to the Total Absti- 
nence Pledge. The towns and schools in Rhode 
Island are so contiguous that I could reach and 
address several gatherings in a day. The re- 
sult was that I obtained over seven thousand 
signatures to the pledge. They would be en- 
tered upon a large card, framed, and hung in 
their schoolroom. The signers in each neigh- 
borhood would organize into a society and hold 
meetings once a month. I have been told that 
the interest created by that movement continued 
in that State for years, and I sometimes wish 
I had continued that work for the remainder 
of my life. 

Home Again in Detroit Conference. 

In the fall of 1868 I was appointed finan- 
cial agent of Albion College for the Detroit 
Conference, and I worked in co-operation with 
Rev. M. A. Daugherty for the Michigan Con- 
ference. We raised a large amount to apply 
on a newly-erected college building, and also 
several thousands for the endowment fund. 
So I am thankful that even a little of my life- 

81 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

work has gone to build up that institution, 
which wields such a splendid influence to-day. 

A new experience in the itinerancy of Meth- 
odism came to me during the next four years, 
in which I was presiding elder of Romeo Dis- 
trict, and also in the succeeding four years as 
presiding elder of the Ann Arbor District. 
This appointment was a great favor to me, as 
it enabled me to keep my children in the uni- 
versity, which they had already entered. 

In the fall of 1874 the Detroit and Michi- 
gan Conferences each appointed a committee 
to act as one for selecting and obtaining a site 
for a Michigan State Camp-ground. The rail- 
roads of the State conveyed the committee free 
of expense to several places, and to some places 
twice, for the purpose of making their exami- 
nations. After mature deliberations the com- 
mittee accepted the proposition made by the 
Grand Rapids and Indiana Road and the peo- 
ple of Petoskey, to locate in the vicinity of that 
place. Their offer was to donate the land 
(about three hundred acres), one thousand 
dollars in money to be expended upon the land, 

82 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

and to build their railroad from Petoskey down 
to the land. We were to obligate ourselves to 
hold a camp-meeting annually for fifteen years, 
and to have erected a certain number of cot- 
tages each year for at least ten years. The 
conditions on both sides w r ere accepted. The 
committee incorporated the "Michigan Camp- 
ground Association" under the laws of the 
State, organized a board of trustees, and 
adopted a constitution and by-laws, and I was 
elected the secretary, which office I held for 
thirteen years. At one of the first meetings the 
following record was made: "On motion of S. 
Reed, the name of the place shall be called Bay 
View." After a few years it was learned that 
the natural attraction of the place would draw 
families to it from great distances, and hold 
them there through the summer season, and 
that, therefore, some further privileges should 
be provided than simply what the camp-meeting 
furnished. It was resolved to inaugurate privi- 
leges along educational lines; hence various 
schools and lecture-courses were opened. It 
was soon learned that these various side-inter- 

83 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

ests should have a managing head, and after 
much deliberation it was decided that John M. 
Hall should take charge. He undertook the 
work with rigor, and under his management 
this department of Bay View has grown to vast 
proportions. The Bay View Magazine, which 
he originated and publishes, has readers all 
over the United States, while during these 
thirty years the educational work has proved 
very useful and attractive. 

In 1877 I was appointed to Saginaw City, 
where I passed two pleasant years. No great 
revival occurred, but a good parsonage was 
built and paid for which added greatly to the 
strength of the charge. 

From there I was appointed to the city of 
Corunna. The society here had no place for 
social work and worship save the audience- 
room. We built an addition to the church, of 
some smaller rooms which met this great need. 
During my second year there the Owosso 
Charge, which for some years had seemed to 
be declining, was added to Corunna as an after- 
noon appointment. The presiding elder told 

84 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

the Owosso people that this would be their per- 
manent relation. But at the close of the year 
my mind was convinced that Methodism could 
never be built up in that town under that ar- 
rangement; so I went to the cabinet and re- 
quested that Owosso be restored to the list of 
appointments, that no missionary money be 
given to help support it (as had been done for 
some years), and that I be appointed to the 
charge. I was appointed. I moved my family 
on to the charge, and people said they did not 
know what to do with us. I told them if they 
would work with me to the best of their ability, 
I would make no complaint. They promised 
and fulfilled. God blessed our work from first 
to last. 

From 1883 to 1893 I spent four years as 
presiding elder on the Flint District and six 
years on the Saginaw District. During all my 
eighteen years in that relation I formed very 
strong friendships with the preachers and the 
people. I also learned how this relation has, 
for nearly a century and a half, withstood the 
demands of different sections of the Church 

85 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

for its modification or abolishment. This su- 
perintendency is imbedded in the very vital 
principles of Methodist economy. 

Rev. Luther Lee, whose name was promi- 
nent in American Methodism in the last cen- 
tury, spent the closing years of his life in Flint. 
In 1885 his wife passed to her eternal home. 
Rev. I. N. Elwood was their pastor in Flint, 
and I the presiding elder. We learned that 
Dr. Lee had not means enough in this world 
to defray the expenses of his wife's funeral, 
whereupon we wrote the fact to a few of our 
friends, and there came promptly to our hands 
money enough for the funeral expenses, with a 
balance sufficient to purchase a lot in Glenwood 
Cemetery, this city, which we did, and had it 
deeded to the Detroit Corporate Conference. 
It is a beautiful lot, beautifully located. There 
rest in it at the present time the remains of 
Mrs. Lee, Dr. Lee, I. N. Elwood, Mrs. Seth 
Reed, and a child of Rev. Joseph Frazer. At 
the close of our Conference a few years ago, 
while waiting for the bishop to come in and 

86 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

read our appointments, I arose and stated that 
the grave of Dr. Luther Lee remained un- 
marked, and that soon the wear of time would 
obliterate it from human sight and human 
memory. In a very few minutes money was 
raised to place a beautiful stone at its head, 
which tells the world whose body sleeps there. 

Retired Relation. 

At the Conference of 1893 I was entered 
upon the retired list. Under God's blessing 
my health for most of the time since has been 
good. My ears and eyes are serving me well, 
never having needed glasses for reading or 
anything else. I have been able to do consider- 
able work in assisting Churches and pastors, 
work which I love to do, and expect to love 
till I draw my last breath. I believe my inter- 
est in the Church and her work has not declined 
with my increasing years. 

For about two years I supplied our charge 
in Gaylord, during which a new and good 
church was built. I have supplied other 

87 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

charges for shorter periods of time, and have 
assisted often in quarterly meetings and in va- 
rious special occasions. 

On the 13th of September, 1899, there was 
joined with my life the life of Miss Henrietta 
Andrew to cheer me through the remainder of 
my journey. And this she does both by her 
natural endowments and by the graces of the 
Spirit. 

We selected Flint as our future place of 
residence. We are happy in the fellowship of 
the people of the Court Street Church and their 
talented, consecrated minister, Dr. A. R. Johns, 
with whom we worship. 

I have a daily reminder of the kindness of 
the Garland Street Church people in the staff 
on which, Jacob-like, I lean. 

Among our happiest days and richest privi- 
leges we regard the summers spent at Lake 
Orion, where for nine consecutive years, begin- 
ning in 1900, the Orion Bible Conference was 
held. Under the management of such men as 
Rev. P. V. Jenness, Rev. J. M. Barkley, A. L. 
Parker, Esq., Major J. H. Cole, and others 

88 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

like them, together with the attractions and 
facilities of the place, it is not surprising that 
the Conference should even in so short a tim£ 
have gained such a wide and blessed influence. 
Each year men of international fame appeared 
upon its platform: J. Campbell White, G. 
Campbell Morgan, W. C. Pearce, George Elli- 
ott, and many others. It is a matter of regret 
by many good people that the place was allowed 
to fall under influences of another kind. 

When the project of an Old People's Home 
for Detroit Conference was started, Mrs. Reed 
and myself entered into it with much interest. 
The enterprise was launched and a Home was 
opened in Chelsea in 1906, Mr. and Mrs. F. P. 
Glazier and Mrs. Emily Glazier, his mother, 
giving some fifteen acres of land and $10,000 
in cash toward it. We not having money to 
give, gave ourselves, and for a year and a half, 
during which time the building was erected, 
equipped, and a family of eighteen enrolled, 
took charge of it. We doubtless should have 
remained but for the breakdown that threat- 
ened Mrs. Reed's health. The Home has had 

89 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

a remarkable growth in strength and favor 
among the people. Its rooms are now filled 
with over thirty members, and plans for en- 
largement must soon be considered. Among 
the faithful friends and trustees none has been 
more successful in its upbuilding than Dr. J. E. 
Jacklin, of Detroit. 

The Detroit Conference was organized in 
1856, with myself as its secretary, in which 
office I was continued four years. Of the four- 
teen brethren who have been its secretaries 
since then, eight are now on the other shore. 
The Conference was incorporated under the 
laws of the State in 1876, and I have been the 
secretary of the corporation for thirty-six years. 
This body of ministers is very dear to my heart. 
I think of no one of them but as my friend. 
It is my only earthly brotherhood, and I want 
no other. The favors and kindnesses extended 
to me by my brethren I can not number, much 
less repay. My prayer is that, as they come 
to the slope of the hill, similar attentions and 
considerations may be shown them. 

To participate in the Centennial Anniver- 

90 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

sary of Michigan Methodism, which was held 
in Central Church, Detroit, under the skillful 
management of its then pastor, Dr. F. D. 
Leete, was a sweet joy to me. This occasion, 
combined with the fifty-fifth session of our An- 
nual Conference, made a rich feast. The part 
assigned me in the anniversary was the sermon 
Sunday morning, in which were reviewed the 
"Gains and Losses of Fifty Years." Dr. J. M. 
Buckley, who shared largely in the celebration, 
asked me for the manuscript for publication in 
the Christian Advocate, and on being told that 
I had none, he said, "I will give you just thirty 
days to prepare one." I promised him and 
did it. About the holiday season, what was- 
my surprise on opening a large package that 
came to my door, to learn that some of the 
brethren nearer home had secured its publica- 
tion in pamphlet form for general distribution ! 
In the same fall my brethren sent me as 
their representative to the Centennial Celebra- 
tion of the Genesee Conference, held in Roch- 
ester, New York. The Territory of Michigan 
was a part of the original Genesee Conference. 

9i 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

It was within the bounds of this Conference 
that I began my religious life, and the memories 
recalled and the friendships formed at the cele- 
bration are precious. I was pleased to meet 
here my friend and former pastor in Flint, 
Rev. Clarence E. Allen, D. D., now pastor of 
Richmond Avenue Church, Buffalo, New York, 
and popular as ever. 

The fact of my being something of an an- 
tiquity was borne in upon me here. Sunday 
morning, when the families and their guests 
were at church, the maids of the households 
had their time for visiting over the telephone. 
One conversation between two Irish girls ran 
thus: "Have you seen that man among the 
ministers that is so tall, walks so straight, and 
has a long, white beard?" "Yes," said the 
other. "Well, do you know who he is?" " Oh, 
yes; that's Moses. I was never acquainted 
with Moses, but I Ve heard a great deal about 
him, and I Ve seen his picture, and I 'm sure 
that 's Moses." 

In 19 1 2 our General Conference was held 
in Minneapolis. I had had birthday-showers 

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THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

other years in June, but this year a shower 
began in April that proved a real spring down- 
pour. It continued until the flood bore me on 
its crest to Minneapolis and home again, and 
provided me with all comforts throughout the 
Conference. To Dr. A. B. Leonard, my su- 
perintendent, am I indebted for the initiative, 
and to Dr. Johns and a host of others for the 
consummation of one of the most pleasant 
events of my life. 

I confess pleasure at seeing my name with 
those of the original organizers of the Anti- 
Saloon League, which occurred in Washington, 
D. C, in 1893, and to greater pleasure at see- 
ing the progress the cause has made since that 
day. 

I also give thanks to God that I live to 
see the great rising of missionary zeal in the 
Christian Church. This wave is not confined 
to any denomination, but is reaching the hearts 
of believers everywhere, to unite them in the 
prayer of Jesus, "That they may be one, that 
the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me." 

In my earlier years I cherished the hope 

93 



THE STORY OF MY LIFE 

that I might some day visit the land of Pales- 
tine. But as that prospect fades, the prospect 
of seeing the New Jerusalem brightens. 

During the seventy years of my ministry, 
through God's blessing I have been permitted 
to respond to the first roll-call of my Confer- 
ence each year. It is my prayer that He will 
enable me to continue this record until I re- 
spond to the Roll-Call above. 



94 



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